Good morning, everybody.
You can mute.
Welcome to all of the audience. We are coming to you from Singapore. I'd like to extend a very warm welcome on behalf of Telix leadership and the China Grand Pharma leadership to this morning's investor webinar on the opportunity for radiopharmaceuticals in China. Just a couple of messages I've been asked to pass on before we start. First of all, questions we will hold till the end. Those who would like to ask a question can file a DM to the moderator, which is available down the bottom of the screen. Secondly, those who are listening in, who are native Chinese speakers or Mandarin speakers, there is a separate channel which is accessible at the bottom of the Zoom screen as well. These are our n ext slide.
These are our respective company disclaimers. Next slide. I think today we have a very interesting agenda for the event. I'll introduce the co-speakers in a moment. We're going to start by just reviewing the Telix Grand Pharma partnership, which is now two and a half years mature. We started this partnership in late October 2020, and I think as you'll see as we go through, we've had a very productive partnership thus far. The Grand Pharma team is gonna shed some insights into the major trends in nuclear medicine and radiopharmaceuticals in China, and then we'll review our respective prostate, renal, and brain cancer programs, specifically in relation to China.
The Grand Pharma team will shed some light on the unique supply chain and manufacturing capabilities in China. Next slide. I've got a very esteemed line up today. David Cade is my name, CEO of Telix in the Asia Pacific. It's a major part of our business, ranging from China across to Japan and all the way down to Australia and New Zealand. I'd like to pass to my colleague, Dr. Christian Behrenbruch, to give a brief introduction, and then we'll go through the other presenters as well.
Yeah. Thanks very much, David. It's a real privilege to be here with our Grand Pharma colleagues. I'm Christian Behrenbruch, I'm the Group CEO of Telix, and, you know, it's just so exciting to have the opportunity to provide this update. Hand over to you, Wei.
Thank you. First of all, it's a very great opportunity for Telix and Grand Pharma together to hold this meeting. Thank you all to join the meeting. I'm Weikun Tang, the Chairman of Grand Pharma group. Frank.
Hi. Hello, everyone. This is Frank Zhou, the CEO of Grand Pharma. It's very glad to meet the my Telix friends here and have this opportunity to share some information together with Telix to other investors. Thank you.
Next slide.
I thought we'd start off with our respective organizations giving a bit of an introduction. Certainly for the Grand Pharma shareholders, it's a privilege to be able to introduce ourselves as a key partner and a strategic and valued partner to Grand Pharma. We are a commercial stage radiopharmaceutical company, developing both diagnostic and therapeutic radiopharmaceuticals. We are headquartered in Melbourne, Australia. We have a strong APAC nexus, of course, with our Grand Pharma colleagues, which has been, frankly, very convenient during the period of our collaboration because it's easy for our teams to work together. We are a global company and in fact, our aspirations very much reflect that from a workforce development and a strategic partner development perspective.
As I mentioned, we're a commercial stage company. We just actually put out our quarterly financial results this week. There's an opportunity there to learn more about the company from our disclosures if you like. I'll just ask if there are folks on the call, if you could please just mute your line, that would be appreciated. We are five years old as a public company. The relationship with Grand Pharma really has come into the middle of that period. It's certainly been an important strategic focus area for the company. I think one of the things that we're going to talk about today is radiopharmaceuticals is a global business.
The supply chain and manufacturing of radiopharmaceuticals is a global activity, and that China is certainly one of the countries that's picking up and accelerating rapidly as this field gets traction. I think the most interesting thing about the radiopharmaceutical space is that this is a very cost-effective oncology strategy. When we think about why will nuclear medicine receive adoption globally, it's because it is cost-effective. It's cost-effective whether you're a patient in Australia or the United States or if you're a patient in China. One of the things that we believe very passionately in, and I think our relationship with Grand Pharma reflects that, is that these medicines need global access. Patients everywhere need to have access to this capability. That's what makes this relationship so exciting. May I have the next slide, please?
Just for those of you who are new to radiopharmaceuticals, the Grand Pharma team and us thought it would be useful just to briefly explain what a radiopharmaceutical is. In short, both Grand Pharma and Telix have a fairly agnostic viewpoint as to whether a radiopharmaceutical is best as a small molecule or a peptide or an antibody protein of some kind. In essence, what this field involves is taking a targeting agent, some sort of a molecule that has affinity for a cancer target, and then attaching a radioactive payload and injecting that into the body. And that's how we deliver this very targeted and precise radiation. This is very different from traditional radiation oncology, where you use external beam radiation to shoot high-energy X-rays at a patient.
Of course, we have an extensive pipeline of products in this area. Of course, Grand Pharma has an extensive commitment to this field, both in the radiopharmaceutical and medical device setting. Very experienced and knowledgeable partner. One of the neat things about this class of drugs is that when you inject a low dose or use a diagnostic, radionuclide or isotope, you get to image a patient. You get to see everywhere from your toes to your nose where that, that target is represented in the body. Then when you scale up that radiation or you use a therapeutic radionuclide, you get to treat that target. We, we have a shared vision of seeing it and treating it.
This is a really profound concept, and I think it's a game changer for oncology. It's really precision medicine, at its finest. That's your science lesson for the day. We'll be talking about some clinical things later on, but that's a high-level summary of how this technology, delivers value to patients. Over to you, David.
Thank you, Chris. Again, it's my pleasure to have this opportunity to share some information of Grand Pharma to the investors and analysts, especially for, I think, for Telix investor to know as the strategic partner of Telix, what Grand Pharma is and how strong your partner's partner is. I would like to spend some time to have a brief introduction of Grand Pharma. In terms of for Grand Pharma, we are an international pharmaceutical company. We have three core business sector, including the pharmaceutical technology and the nuclear medicine and the precise interventional technology and biotechnology. Under these three core business areas, we have seven business units. You may have noticed that after these three core business segments, we ended with the technology.
The reason is our pipeline currently does have innovative figures, we do believe only the scientific, you know, breakthrough and innovative products can solve the clinical difficulties, especially like the radiopharmaceutical products is one of the innovative, you know, solutions for the clinical difficulties. In terms of our performance for Grand Pharma, we can say we have realized very steadily and healthy growth in recent years. Last year, we achieved nearly RMB 9.6 billion revenue and RMB 2.1 billion profits. We invested nearly RMB 2.5 billion in R&D and innovative products. No doubt, the products we licensed in from Telix is one of our, you know, key investment. We now have reserved 136 projects under research. 55 of them are innovative projects.
Last years, we have obtained 13 commercialization approvals and have achieved 17 clinical progresses. In terms of the commercialization, I think this is one of the figures under the chapter why Telix choose us, 'cause we have very strong commercialization capabilities. We have 3,800 sales personnels, and our global sales network has covered more than 50 countries and regions. Last year, we have 17 products. Annual sales exceed 100 million RMB. Okay, next slide. This slide shows our nuclear medicine history. As I mentioned, nuclear medicine and tumor diagnosis and treatment segment is one of our very core strategic segments and also one of our most globalized segments. The strategic, you know, planning history of this segment can be tracked back to 2018.
That year, we have officially entered into the field of nuclear medicine. In 2020, this is a very big milestone for Grand Pharma in this segment. That year, we established our strategic partnership with Telix. That year, we also established the strategic cooperation with Jiangsu Institute of Nuclear Medicine and acquired Puer Weiye and enter into collaborative framework agreement with Nuclear and Radiation Safety Center in the same year. Since then, our company has obtained the relevant qualifications for the development, production, and treating various nuclear medicine in China. In 2021 and 2022, we established product strategy cooperation with ITM Germany and jointly established a review pharmaceutical research with Sun Yat-sen University, respectively, further strengthen the R&D of RDC drugs.
Three series of actions, including product introduction, qualification layout, and R&D cooperation. We have established a comprehensive nuclear medicine anti-tumor diagnosis and treatment platform. We have achieved a comprehensive layout in the field of R&D, production, sales, regulatory qualifications, and have established a complete in-industry chain in this segment. Now, I'm very proud we have reserved 13 innovative products in the segment, which cover the six R&D ISTOPs. Six Isotopes and eight cancer indications, forming a product cluster with the core of yttrium-90 micro injection. The products can provide patients with multi-indication treatment, multi-methods, and integrated diagnosis and treatment of the world-leading anti-tumor solutions, and most of them are coming from Telix. To this day, we have been adhering to consolidate our company's goal, leading position in the field of nuclear medicine together with Telix. Next slide.
David.
Thank you, Frank. I think it's a very nice summary of Grand Pharma and the expertise in the China market. This is a snapshot of the structure of the partnership. The partnership between Telix and Grand Pharma is now two and a half years old, having been entered into in October of 2020. Essentially, Telix's view is that to be a dominant global player, a leading player in radiopharmaceuticals in the world, one needs to have a plan for China. In China Grand Pharma, we feel we have a rock solid plan. The nature of the partnership is really structured into two components. There are two really, you know, important governing agreements, as certainly the Telix investors will recall.
The first one is an imaging products commercialization agreement, which is essentially a distribution agreement for three key imaging assets. The second one is a therapeutic products licensing agreement, which really is a formal licensing agreement of the three key therapeutic assets, 591, 250, and 101, where China Grand Pharma holds the development and commercialization rights in China. In summary, the partnership has been a very fruitful partnership. It covers obviously mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan. I think the output is crystal clear for 591 CDx, which is also known as Illuccix, where it's been commercialized, our leading imaging asset. Also 250 CDx, the fast-following asset for kidney cancer imaging, which just finished Phase III development.
Each of these has been granted, what's called an Investigational New Drug approval. The trial, clinical trials in human subjects can commence in China, and I'll go into those in a bit more detail shortly. On the therapeutic side, just in the recent weeks, we've been also granted an IND from the Chinese regulator for TLX101 for glioblastoma, and that will go into phase I development very shortly. Really, you know, what this demonstrates is that collectively we have been, I think, very successful with the Chinese regulator, the National Medical Products Administration. It's a very highly regulated market, China these days. 15 or 20 years ago it was not, but the NMPA is as thorough a regulator as the U.S. FDA is these days.
Essentially what we're aiming to do with these trials is to coordinate them and align them as much as possible with Telix's global development plans for these assets outside of China, so that Chinese patients can be included, and we do it as simultaneously as possible, so that we have a clear pathway to approval of these products. Back to you, Frank.
Okay. Thank you, David. I think we are at very optimistic about the future and the potential for further value creation of partnerships, because since we established partnerships, we kept a very strong know and smooth communications between each other. Yeah. Okay. Next slide. For next part, I will introduce the trend of nuclear medicine in China, because this is last several years, a lot of changes and of course, very positive changes in China. With this market development and data, of course, in the future, I will, you know, later I will show some data. We could have much deeper understanding about the nuclear medicine market and prospect in China. Nuclear medicine has developed a new treatment method for cancers, no doubt.
As an innovative therapy, it also drew very extensive attention in China. In recent years, various, you know, ministries and commissions in China have intensively issued a number of policies to positively support the development of nuclear medicine. For example, in June 2021, the first programmatic document was issued for the application of nuclear technology in medical and health field in China. The service of these policies has greatly permitted, promoted the development of nuclear medicine in China. Benefiting from the government support, the approval authorities for nuclear medical equipment was delegated. Data shows that the number of nuclear medical examination cases has increased sharply from 2017 to 2022.
If we benchmark development countries globally, the demand for nuclear medicine will explore deeply in China. If we look at the data, according to the data, the market skills of vascular medical application in China has achieved 6.2 billion RMB in 2019, and will increase to 13.8 billion by 2024, with a CAGR of 18.6%. It's a very high CAGR. Taking liver cancer as an example. According to the data, we can say there were more than 900,000 new cases of liver cancer. Nearly 830,000 deaths in 2020 around the global.
In the same year, there were nearly 410,000 new cases of liver cancer and more than 390,000 deaths. It means that half of the world new liver cancer patients are in China. Even the surgical treatment is the first choice for liver tumors, nearly 80% of patients with liver cancer cannot take surgery. The tumor downstaging will be the hope for these patients to take surgery. This indicate a huge market potential for nuclear pharmaceuticals. For the next section, we will introduce the imaging and the therapy of prostate cancer. Next slide.
Thanks, Frank.
Yeah.
We will now move into the programs, prostate cancer, renal cancer, and glioblastoma. Let's dive into those, and obviously, we'll focus on the progress that we are collectively making in China. For prostate cancer, we have an imaging and therapy program, TLX591-CDx, which most would know is branded as Illuccix in the markets in which it's approved, United States, Canada, and Australia. Obviously, this asset needs to be approved in China as quickly as possible, and we have a clear plan for that. The way we are doing it is that TLX591-CDx, let's call it Illuccix for simplicity, will commence a Phase III study in China very shortly. It's open for recruitment now. The Chinese regulator gave approval late last year to run this trial.
This trial will recruit 110 patients across eight sites in China, so about 14 patients per site, roughly. The primary endpoints for this trial are safety and tolerability. Ultimately, what this data that is generated from this 110 patient trial will show is that the data are comparable to the data packages that were used in the United States to get FDA approval some time ago. This is a registration-enabling study in China once it's completed. On the right, TLX591, which is the therapeutic asset. The nature of the part of the collaboration between Telix and Grand Pharma is such that wherever possible, the development of this asset globally will be aligned as much as possible with the development of the asset in China.
Ultimately what our aim is to include China patients in China into the global program, which is the registration trial for this asset internationally.
Okay. For the electrician, I will present with some data of prostate cancer in China. We can say in 2020, the number of prostate cancer new cases in China was about 11,500, which ranked the 2nd in the world. The number of prostate cancer deaths in China was about 51,000, which ranked the 1st in the world. The incidence rate and the mortality rate of prostate cancer ranked 60 and 7th among male tumors in China. In addition, we can say the data has shown that there were total 440,000 patients with prostate cancer in China by 2020, the number is expected to exceed one million by 2025.
In the newly diagnosed patient, the portion of late-stage patients is 67%, which is 3.5 times of that in the U.S., and the five-year survival rate in China is less than 70%, while the number in the developed countries is as high as, you know, 97%. In the meantime, prostate cancer and mortality rates are on the rise in China. Both incidence rate and the mortality rate of prostate cancer have been increasing significantly in the past decades. In 2016, the incidence rate and the mortality rate of prostate cancer ranked sixth and eighth respectively among the male cancer in China. This number represents an urgent clinical demand of diagnosis and treatment of prostate cancer in China.
This is the exciting part for me, certainly as a physician by background. We get into the science, but I'll keep it very simple. What is PSMA? PSMA is a very exciting protein, prostate-specific membrane antigen, that is expressed on the surface of prostate cancer cells. That's a diagram or a cartoon on the right-hand side. We can see the cell membrane down at the bottom.
Obviously protruding outside of the cell is this unique protein known as PSMA, which acts as a unique identifier for a prostate cancer cell. This piece of protein very helpfully is expressed in prostate cancers when they're in the prostate gland or when they have spread to lymph nodes in the pelvis or lymph nodes more further afield, but also in places like when the cancer spreads to the lung or when it spreads to bones. This enables us to find the prostate cancer wherever it is in the body. Importantly, the PSMA is not expressed on normal cells to any significant extent, but in cancer cells it is hugely over expressed, somewhere between 100 and 1,000 times in the vast majority of prostate cancers in most men.
We can exploit this property and target it both for imaging and for therapy of these cancers. Next slide. This is an example of how it actually works, what we call the mechanism of action. Slightly a larger picture here. On the top of that diagram is a Y-shaped molecule, and what that aims to demonstrate is that the molecule that takes the radiation that we are using to either image or treat the prostate cancer, it carries that radiation and uniquely attaches to the PSMA protruding outside the cell. We can attach gallium, which is used for imaging, that's what Telix does, or we can attach therapeutic isotopes like lutetium to treat these cancers.
What happens is once it, once it binds to the PSMA, it is then internalized into the inside of the cell where the radiation is kept. It emits radiation that can be either imaged using a PET, a PET camera, or it can emit a radiation that damages the DNA and destroys the cell. We normally do it in that sequence. We image the cancer, then we treat the cancer in the following weeks. Next slide. This is Telix's Illuccix. This is what's been commercialized in the United States and Canada and Australia. We're aiming to commercialize this in China as well. It's a three-part kit. I think most of Telix's investors would know this very well, but for Grand Pharma's investors, you probably haven't seen it before.
Where we use it currently in the United States is really in three clinical settings, described on the right there, and I'll explain very briefly what they are. The first clinical setting is in men that have got a new diagnosis of prostate cancer, and we are aiming to stage them. What staging means is we have established the diagnosis, but we aim to find out how much prostate cancer that patient has got and where it's located in the body. That's critically important so that we can send them off to the correct first treatment. The second indication there is, when we have treated that patient, we've either done a prostatectomy or we have done radiation therapy with the intent to cure them, so the patient is now cured. In the following years, unfortunately, sometimes the cancer can come back.
With normal imaging, like a CT scan or an MRI scan, we can't see where it is, but they've got a blood test suggesting that their PSA is rising, which is very, very suggestive of the cancer having come back. We aim to image it with PSMA, and we can typically see exactly where the cancer is, whereas conventional imaging is not able to do that. That's why this is such a major advance. Of course, the third one, which is a new indication, this was approved recently by the Food and Drug Administration in the U.S., and we aim to seek this indication in China, of course, is for selecting men to work out whether they are appropriate for subsequent treatment with Lutetium radioligand therapy. Patient selection as well. Next slide. This is just a snapshot.
This is out of our recent financial results. These have been presented and the market understands these, I think very well. The overriding message here is that the growth in uptake of Illuccix and PSMA PET imaging, particularly in the United States since we launched the product in April of last year, has been really quite explosive. This shows that when we take this new standard of care imaging modality that is in clinical trials shown to be vastly superior to what we used to have just three or four years ago, which was a CT scan or an MRI scan, this is a much superior imaging modality, and you can see why it is being taken up so quickly in a new market like the United States.
Now, where it's not broadly available, which is China, this is really an indication for such a massive market like China of what the potential is once we complete that trial and get Illuccix approved in China. Next slide.
Could I add something?
Yeah, sure.
I think I just wanna add a comment as well. I think, you know, one of the things that Frank mentioned was that Chinese patients are typically diagnosed later. What we're actually going to experience in China is some overlap of indication, but also some really new patient populations. It would be a mistake for investors to think that there's this very bright boundary condition between what we do in the rest of the world and what we do in China. I actually think we're gonna learn lessons about prostate cancer from Chinese patients that we don't learn in the rest of the world, and that's gonna have a follow-on effect on how we think about therapeutics as well.
I just wanna convey that it's not about just expanding the market and moving into another market.
I actually think there's gonna be a profound understanding about prostate cancer based on this experience. Do you have anything to... It'd be nice to make this a bit more conversational, so I think, what do you think, Frank?
Yeah, I totally agree, 'cause, you know, China is a very, how to say? Is a little kinda special region and a lot of different in the policies, but I think it's positive policies. Before, we do not have this kind of product to use in the patients. I think patients, there are a lot of, you know, strong demand for these patients. As you, as you mentioned, not only for the new patients, but also for the, you know, also has existing patients. That means a lot of, you know, number for the patients will be larger than we imagined, larger than data. Yeah.
We'll just move into, I think we've got two case studies here that I think really highlight the usefulness in the clinic of Illuccix and PSMA PET imaging. This is a very interesting case in a patient, a male patient, for initial staging, where he's been recently diagnosed with prostate cancer. What we find is that PSMA PET imaging with Illuccix provides so much more information about the extent of this patient's disease that we wouldn't have had three or four years ago if we just only had CT scans. He's recently had a prostate biopsy. That's a very standard step to establish the diagnosis.
He has what's called a Gleason score of zero, which suggests that when the biopsy needle was placed into the prostate gland to pick up some cancer tissue, that it might have been a missed biopsy. It might have gone to a part of the prostate that didn't have cancer in it. The reason we suspect that is because this patient's PSA level is 23. He's probably got prostate cancer. What we see on the right with the CT scan is it really doesn't tell us anything. It cannot resolve where the cancer is located. When we do an Illuccix scan, we see that he's got regional lymph nodes and bony metastases included.
This man is not suitable for a prostatectomy probably, not suitable for radiation therapy to cure him. He will need a different form of treatment that addresses all of that disease. We would have got that wrong three or four years ago if we did not have this information. Next slide, please. This is a different setting altogether. I think there's three messages to take away from this. The first is, this set of images is taken with a very special piece of equipment. It's a PET camera. In fact, it's made by a China manufacturer, United Imaging. It's called the uEXPLORER. It's the first 3D digital PET CT machine.
Very, very sophisticated piece of equipment that can take the images, you see on the right in sort of minutes, one or two minutes. Whereas with a standard PET scanner, it's sort of a 20-minute to 30-minute exercise. It's a very, very high-quality camera. It comes from China. It's just being rolled out now, and it enables us to acquire these images very quickly. I think the second point is that these images provide exquisite re-resolution, whereas, you know, with conventional imaging, we can't really see cancer that's less than a centimeter in size. With this machine, and with Illuccix, we can pick up absolutely tiny lesions of cancer anywhere in the body, right down to a the millimeter range, three millimeters in this case.
Really the third thing to take away here is that this patient has been very heavily pre-treated with other types of treatment that have failed, and we can see exactly what type of disease he's got now. He's got very extensive disease in lymph nodes around the body and in various bones around the body. He will need a type of treatment that addresses all of that. Next slide, please. I think there's a very important point to make here is that there is a lot of excitement in therapy for prostate cancer using small molecules to carry the radiation to the target. That's been proven. Novartis launched Pluvicto in a number of major markets last year, and it has proven an advance. There are some drawbacks.
You know, that small molecule approach does also target some of the normal tissues, like the tear ducts and the tear glands and the salivary glands, also parts of the spinal cord as well. There are some, what we call off-target effects. Telix's antibody approach is a very highly differentiated approach, and we believe has some very significant potential benefits, and that's why we're taking it into the Phase III ProstACT GLOBAL study. These benefits really can be summarized as two key things. First of all, the antibody approach using a large molecule really only targets the prostate cancer itself and has very reduced off-target effects, so we don't see the side effects that we do with small molecules.
Secondly, because the antibody binds at the cancer site and stays there much more durably, we only need a much fewer number of treatments for the patients. Two treatments with the Telix approach rather than four, five or six, it requires a much smaller amount of radiation as well compared to the small molecule approach. A very significantly differentiated asset, we're keen to develop this in China simultaneously to our development in Western markets. Next slide, please. Moving on to the second program, kidney cancer imaging and therapy. Next slide, please. We have reported obviously just in the last few months, February, that our Phase III ZIRCON trial met its primary endpoints very strongly, this was reported at a major congress in the United States in February.
This was our Phase III registration trial. What are we doing in China? We recently had approval from the Chinese regulator to embark on the clinical development program for this asset, and it comprises two parts. The first part is a Phase I study that we call ZIRDOSE-CP China. That's a study that is starting at the moment. Then that Phase I study, which is very small, will immediately proceed into the ZIRCON China study, which is our Phase III trial in China that will bridge, in other words, provide very similar information to our main ZIRCON trial that's gonna get approved for this product in Western markets. Primary endpoints are diagnostic efficacy, sensitivity and specificity. That's very similar to our ZIRCON trial.
This will recruit 98 patients across 10 sites, so sort of 10 patients a site, and this is intended as our NMPA registration enabling study once we complete this study. Next slide.
Okay. Thanks, David. I will make introduction about the renal cancer in China. Again, show some figures to explain. According to the GLOBOCAN data, in 2020, new cases and the deaths of renal cancer in China is nearly 74,000 and 43,000 respectively. Both of them ranked the first in the world. Compared with other cancers in 2020, the incidence rate of renal cancer ranked seventeenth, and the morbidity rate ranked fourteenth among tumor in China. If we consider the context of aging population, the incidence rate of renal cancer is continuing to rise in China. Among all type of renal cancer, ccRCC is the most common one, accounting for nearly 60% to 80%. The market status has forecast that the market is expected to reach 4.5 billion RMB by 2025. David.
I think, I'm not gonna spend a lot of time talking about the CA9 target, but I do wanna sort of elaborate one important concept. This is a pan-cancer target. We've elected to pursue it in renal cancer for a variety of clinically expedient reasons from the outset. One of the exciting aspects about the relationship with Grand Pharma in particular is that there are a number of other cancers, particularly cancers that are prevalent in the Asian environment, Asian epithelial cancers, where CA9 is highly expressed. The vision that we have from a Telix perspective is that we will get started with renal together. We will align the work that we're doing in China with the work that we've done globally.
You know, we do expect to file a biologics license application this year in the United States, the clinical work does continue. I think that we see the opportunity to expand this into a lot of other areas of disease in the future. Before, you know, regarding my earlier comment, we're going to learn things about prostate cancer in China that we don't learn elsewhere, but we're also gonna learn things about other cancers that we can bring to our global development. I think that it's really a win-win. It's really an added value relationship from that perspective. Do we have one more slide on this topic? I think we do. Next slide, please.
you know, the bottom line is, as David mentioned, we had excellent results recently from our Phase III trial. As you'll see, whenever we get to a certain clinical inflection point on the global studies, then the Chinese clinical study follows in alliance. That's why we have the TLX250-CDx program up and running now in China as an expedient, an expedited kind of bridging trial. I think that there's plenty of patients available for this study to recruit, and we have the right number of sites. I think that we're gonna get a pretty nice data point out of the collaboration with Grand Pharma soon.
As I said, it's, this target is as important in renal cancer as PSMA is for prostate cancer, and I think it bodes very well for the relationship in China. Do you wanna add anything to that, Frank?
No. It's fine.
Yeah.
Next slide.
Next slide, please, Frank. I think.
It's you.
Oh, it's me.
Yes.
It's still me. Maybe I won't belabor this because, you know, unlike David, I'm not a physician, but I think the point of it is that, you know, diagnosing renal cancer is really complicated, and quite often, we deal with very heterogeneous disease. The ability to determine very clearly that it's a clear cell phenotype, that's something that's important from a diagnosing and surgical staging perspective. This is just a nice example of a patient that would have been treated very differently if it wasn't for this scan. It's not just about detecting microscopic disease or very small disease, but sometimes it's about really correctly assessing what the characteristics and the type of disease burden is. Just really exciting. Next slide is a similar sort of example.
Yeah.
Next slide, please. I've just touched on this very briefly, but we have a whole suite of studies now that are starting globally to look at CA9 as a pan-cancer target. Although the imaging is really important and really exciting and will generate some near-term revenue opportunities for both Telix and Grand Pharma, the actual long-term view is that there are a multitude of cancers for which this target is exciting. Our commitment with Grand Pharma is to develop these assets in as many of these indications that make sense for the Chinese, for the Chinese market. Really we see a lot of depth and long-term collaboration potential around this as we start to expand the 250 franchise into other disease areas.
Currently, we have clinical studies running in triple-negative breast cancer and in bladder cancer. The bladder cancer in particular is exciting 'cause it's about building depth in urology. As you can see from that cartoon on the right, there are a lot of other areas to go into, and some of these are very prevalent cancers in the kinda Asian oncology context. Yeah, very exciting long-term opportunity.
Next slide. Thanks, Chris. Moving last but not least into our neuro-oncology program. This I think is a very exciting study. This is our first therapy study for TLX101 in China. I particularly are excited about this for really two main reasons. First of all, glioblastoma, which is the most deadly and common form of malignant brain cancer, is a devastating disease. We desperately need new therapeutic options to help these patients. Secondly, what I really like about this program is that this Phase I trial called IPAX China is running almost simultaneously to our IPAX study in Western markets as well.
This really enables us to link the pivotal registration development of this study, in both Western markets like the United States and Europe, and China, you know, at the same time. Critically important study. It's a Phase I study, up to 24 patients across four sites. Recently granted, just in the last few weeks, the IND approval from the Chinese regulator, to crack on with this study, and we'll be doing it, you know, almost in parallel with what we're doing in Western markets. Very exciting. Next slide.
Okay. Thanks, David. Before I explain more data of the brain cancer, I want to give some comments for Chris. Chris, you know, print this for about the potential new, you know, indications and new desktops because I think for Grand Pharma, it's a very good relationship with Telix. We definitely would like to have a very long, you know, strategic partnership with Telix. We have strong confidence for the future, you know, different, you know, new products in China. We'll try our best to bring the product into China and to make it a win-win situation for both companies. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. For the brain cancer, the data of brain cancer is similar to the renal cancer in China.
The data has shown that in 2020, the number of new cases and the deaths of brain cancer in China is nearly 80,000 and 65,000 respectively. Both of them also ranked the first in the world. All the numbers, at any time when I saw the numbers, I felt the urgency to bring the products into the clinical. Yeah. The five year mortality rate of brain cancer is second only to pancreatic cancer and lung cancer among systemic tumor in China. As the second common brain cancer, the data estimated that the global drug market of glioblastoma will reach $3.3 billion by 2024. The 10-year CAGR is about more than 10%. Okay.
Yes, I think it's I mean, again, I think most things have been already said that need to be said. As David mentioned, I think really key, unlike the other programs where we're playing catch up with bridging studies, what's really exciting about the partnership with Grand Pharma is that there's a kind of a aligned front of clinical activity. I do believe that the timing of clinical data out of China, which is really about ensuring that the tolerability and safety is similar to what we've seen in Western patients, I think that we will get to a pivotal trial design that will be aligned with both sets of data.
Yes.
Because of the orphan designation and the unmet medical need, you know, this is a program that could move very quickly. Actually it's a very beautiful example of where Grand Pharma's clinical contribution benefits our global clinical development because it will enlarge the data package that we can take into a pivotal trial. We're actually very grateful for the Grand Pharma collaboration for this asset because it will. The China activity will accelerate the development of this program outside of China as well. I think it's really an example of a win-win situation, which is beneficial.
Okay. I think we'll make some introduction about our supply chain and manufacturing.
Okay.
Thanks, Frank. I think at the end of this meeting, I would like to show the investors some industry layout of Grand Pharma in not only in China but also globally, to show all the investors that a better view of Grand Pharma's strategic plan. I think for the development of nuclear medicine, anti-tumor diagnosis and treatment segment.
Grand Pharma have been adhering to the idea of a whole industry chain. In terms of R&D, we associate excellent strategic partners and scientific research institutes at home and abroad to continuously providing technical support and quality assurance for the segment development. I think such as Telix, ITM, and also like Shandong University are this kind of partners. In terms of manufacturing, we take Sirtex as a core and establish a strategic cooperation with also Telix and ITM to build up and oversee nuclear medicine product system. Also in domestics, we take official nuclear medicine policy as guidance by introducing oversee advances, advanced nuclide production technology to establish a domestic nuclear drug production platform.
In terms of sales, you know, in 2020, we acquired Puer Weiye, a China company, thereby obtained a series of domestic radiopharmaceutical production and also operation license qualifications in China. We have become the. I think we are the only listed company in Hong Kong market that we can engage in production, operation and development. We also have a very, very good R&D system in radiopharmaceuticals. You know, we got three. Well, we got radiopharmaceutical sold in China, and also we have like three R&Ds together with Telix in China.
Moreover, we opened up a domestic and overseas nuclear medicine sales networks, and they establish a global sales system through Sirtex in both Shanghai and abroad. After more than five years strategic planning, Grand Pharma now has the ability to produce and develop nuclear medicine on a global scale. We can also conduct clinical trials in many countries and regions around the world through our international R&D centers. The excellent operation of our products and business is realized by a strong team and a product. We have more than 400 employee worldwide in the field of nuclear medicine, antitumor diagnosis and treatment. Among them, more than 40%...
I think more than 40% holds a master or doctor degree. Our global sales network segment covers more than 55 countries and regions. We now have established a solid global nuclear medicine industry chain. In the future, we will adhere to the concept of a globalized layout, differentiated innovation and professional development. In addition to products, we will also actively planning operation qualification, raw materials and a global sales and development channels. We are aiming to form an industry chain with comprehensive advantages. Grand Pharma will continue to stress the R&D and investment in the field of nuclear medicine, antitumor diagnosis and treatment. I think Grand Pharma will be the best partner in China, yeah, for all the nuclear medicine companies. Yeah. Thank you.
Well, thank you, Weikun. We've got five minutes left for questions. I think some instructions were just issued if you would like to lodge a question. I would encourage audience participants to fire away.
Okay. I got the first question from Jin Lan. Is there any update on the 177Lu or 225Ac TLX591 in global or China?
I'll just repeat the question. I think the question was, is there any update for Lutetium TLX 591? Was it 250 or 591? I heard 591.
Okay.
Yep.
We are expecting that in the next, roughly within the next quarter, and so roughly in the next 3 months, that the ProstACT GLOBAL and the ability to start a study in China will align. Our strategy so far has been to take an IND package from the U.S.
Yeah.
bring that to the NMPA. That's really the trigger point, that's the catalyst for that. It's a very high priority for the partnership this year, and to really start to be able to get some preliminary clinical experience in China in a timely way so that we can, you know, include Chinese patients in the ProstACT global study as well. The team is certainly working towards that objective, and we'll be able to provide updates on that in the coming months. It's a good question. Thank you for asking it. Next question.
If you have any question, you can directly to DM me or chat in the chat box.
Yeah, I see. What is the expected ASP? Well, we haven't given guidance yet on drug pricing in China. Frank, do you wanna or Weikun, do you wanna make any comment on nuclear medicine value proposition in China in terms of drug pricing?
Drug pricing?
Yeah.
So-
We haven't really given guidance yet.
Yeah, no guidance for this. Yeah. You know, it's a thanks for the question. It's a big question. If want to understand the price policy and the reimbursement policy in China, I can keep talking for lots of hours for this question. It's a special market, as I mentioned before. That's why I think Telix and other partners try to find a local partner to move in China. What I can say is, you know, currently, the economic is keeping, you know, going up in China. The GDP is keeping rising. The expenses in medical areas is keeping rising. The patients have a lot of, you know, demands and for this product. I think this is first point.
Second point is for the pricing, you know, it's a complex, you know, questions. We need to consider the economic, you know, medical economics and to consider the capability of the patients to pay the price. It's hard to give you a very clear or rough, you know, guide for this. We need to balance to make sure most of the people could get this, these products, and to make sure we also will keep some profits for this. Yeah.
I mean, it's really a two-payment market.
Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
There's the eventual prospect of reimbursement, but that's a long journey. There's an out-of-pocket component, which is actually quite... It's a mistake to think of China as a low-cost country 'cause it's not. It is a very high volume country. David mentioned before the United Imaging Micro Explorer PET scanner. Now, this is an example of how Chinese innovation is actually leading the world in building high-throughput nuclear medicine. This is the market that we're dealing with. It's not a low-cost market. It's a reasonably priced market, but the bifurcation between private pay and/or private pay and insured versus government pay is. It's a much brighter line than it is in the rest of the world. I think that's fair to say.
Yeah.
I agree with you, Chris, and I want to add some comments about this question. I think it's really a very, very good question for, especially for China market. For 591-CDx, this product, we need to know that in the past, almost 10 to 20 years, there is no like this kind of products approved in China. There's no competitor in China, even in the clinical stage. We need to know this. We can see that from the U.S. market, this product shows a very, very good clinical benefit for the patients.
If this product could be approved in China, I think it's a good product, and we have a very huge market in China. Yeah.
Agreed.
Yeah.
I've just seen a question around the royalty agreement. We haven't disclosed any details around a royalty agreement with Grand Pharma for either the diagnostic or the therapeutic programs. What I am comfortable saying is that the, and I think David mentioned it, and it is transparent with respect to our public disclosures. The relationship around the imaging is rather more of a distributor relationship, with the sort of typical economics that you would expect for distributor partnerships. I'd describe it more as a profit-sharing arrangement. That's because these programs are pretty late stage in development, and it's a small amount of clinical effort that's required to really make that last step. For the therapeutic programs, it's more of a royalty-bearing, sort of standard pharma out-licensing.
Very typical industry standard sort of ranges for what you'd expect to see. I think the most important thing is to understand that the economics are very different between the imaging and the therapy. I think that's about the extent to which we can probably disclose. Yeah. Thank you. It's a reasonable question to ask. Obviously, product economics will become more of a focus as we start to launch.
Mm-hmm.
Maybe we have time for one more. I know we've gone over the hour. I know this is fairly generic. Do we have any plans to raise capital? I think that question is out of the scope of both companies. What do you think?
I think for you, this question is
You know, I think both companies are in financially good shape. We're both earnings-driven businesses now. I think one of the nice things about working with Grand Pharma is we really have a lot of similarities in our size and scale. You're a little bit bigger than we are. Grand Pharma is not a Chinese company, it's a global company.
Yeah.
That's what makes it very easy to work together. I think that, you know, we're both public companies, so anything is possible.
Yeah.
I think unless there's one other concluding question, maybe Frank, this is a good one for you or for Weikun. What is the value of RadioPharma products sold today?
You know in China Grand Pharma has a globally radiopharmaceutical business, like Sirtex and also the sales in China. The sales volume is maybe around 1.5 billion RMB globally.
Growing.
Yeah. Growing. Yeah.
Growing. We'll wrap it up.
Yeah. Please.
Well, thank you to the audience for dialing in, both from the China side. I know there's been a lot of interest from Grand Pharma's shareholders and also from the Telix side. I can see there's quite a number of folks that have dialed in from Australia and also outside of Australia. Thank you for diligently listening to what we had to convey to you today. I think it really does demonstrate that we have, you know, a tight partnership that's been extraordinarily fertile and that's only gonna grow over the coming years. Would Frank or Weikun like to make any closing remarks?
Yeah. Thank you again for the investors and analysts to join this meeting. Again, very pleasure to have this opportunity together with Telix to do this. I think it's show our very strong partnership with both parties. Lastly, I want to say with the, you know, the good product and the strong team and the very strong medical need, I think we need to speak up, as Chris mentioned, the first priority for both is to bring the product into, you know, clinical as soon as possible because patients are waiting for us. Let's hurry up. Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
All right.
Thank you very much.